I'm a reporter who has worked in business journalism for the past few years. In August of 2009 I joined Forbes to cover the residential housing market, luxury real estate and all things fancy-house related. I also compare economic statistics across cities for our data-driven rankings, and from time to time I write about other things. Like all New York City natives, I have a special gene for obsessing about square footage, home interiors and real estate market conditions. Follow me on twitter: @ForbesFrancesca.

9/28/2010 @ 3:15PM7,639 views

The New High-Status ZIP Codes

Los Angeles has more than its fair share of astronomically priced homes, but our annual list of the 500 most expensive ZIP codes in the U.S. shows that high-end real estate is expanding beyond Beverly Hills and Bel Air. This year’s most expensive ZIP code is 91008, in Duarte, Calif., on the outskirts of the city, near the Los Angeles national forest. Duarte only has a few homes for sale, but they include massive estates like a nine-bedroom that’s going for $19.8 million.

Don’t mistake a handful of trophy homes hitting the market for signs the luxury housing market is bouncing back. The median home price across all 500 ZIPs in our index fell 5% from last year, and experts worry about a wave of new foreclosures hitting the market. Affluent residents of these tony areas may have the highest property values in the country, but the real estate market isn’t out of the woods yet.

So will 91008 reach the notoriety of coveted 90210? Unclear – few people identify with a ZIP code; they’re more likely to tout their neighborhood or subdivision. Still, our index gives us a chance to look at real estate on a granular level, highlighting the block-to-block differences that really define local markets.

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I see you posted your comment on this last night, SGmarine. I’m a little baffled as to why this mistake hasn’t been corrected already. When a magazine like Forbes is citing the top spot in a list of the country’s most expensive real estate markets, one would think having that headline position made accurate would be pretty important!

Citing the 90018 zip code as “Duarte, CA” is a big mistake (though an easy mistake for anyone not from this area). The most expensive real estate market city should, in fact, read “Bradbury, CA” – because that is actually the city (it is its own incorporated city) that is ecompassed by the 90018 zip code.

Duarte lies to the south and to the east of Bradbury, which itself sits more into the foothills of the San Gabriel Valley area. Bradbury has all the uber-expensive, exclusive estates you’re describing. Duarte is a middle-class community, with moderate sized homes, and is slim-to-none when it comes to mansions.

Your mistake comes from the fact that Bradbury, being as small as it is, shares Duarte’s post office. So when you do a search on that zip code, you will initially come up with “Duarte.” If you look more closely at the listings in this zip, you’ll see they’re in the City of Bradbury.

Your citing of Duarte as the most expensive real estate market, I’m sure, has made area residents do a double (or triple) take!